In the type of article storing facility mentioned above, running operation of the travelling cart and lifting operation of the platform are performed by the crane control means, which controls the stacker crane in order to position the article transfer device to a target transfer position with respect to the article storage units and to transfer articles between the article transfer device and the article storage units.
Such article storing facilities have a problem that articles stored in the article storage units could be moved out from proper storing positions due to incidents, such as an earthquake. For instance, if articles move out from the proper stored position to the front side in the front-back width direction of the storing shelf and are thus projected from the front side of the article storage, the article would contact to the stacker crane which is running along the travelling rails. While, if articles move out from the proper storing position in the sideways widthwise direction of the storing shelf, the article transfer device, which is positioned at the target transfer position could not transfer the articles between the device and the article storage unit. Therefore, for such article storage units, in which articles have moved out from the proper storing position, an operator has to correct of the position of the articles to the proper storing position, and thus it is required that the operator is able to move to each of the article storage units in order to perform the correction.
Further, even in case of a system shut down of the facility or a power supply failure, unloading articles stored in the article storage units is sometimes required. In such a case, an operator has to unload the articles stored in the article storage units by themselves, so that it is necessary that the operator be able to approach each of the article storage units.
Therefore, conventional article storage facilities are provided with a ladder along the vertical-movement guiding masts of the stacker crane, which operators walk up to approach to the target article storage unit. (See, for instance, Patent Publication 1)
In other article storage facilities, a cab is arranged outside of the masts for guiding the lifting of the stacker crane on which operators can board, so that it can be freely lifted along the masts by a lift driving means for the cab. In this case, operators are lifted with the cab to be moved to the point of the target article storage. (See, for instance, Patent Publication 2).